AI-enabled growth could push universal basic income to $10,000 a month, says former OpenAI researcher

[midian182]

A hot potato: When generative AI gets to the point where it can do pretty much everything better than a human, potentially leading to millions of job losses, how will people support themselves? One proposed solution has been universal basic income (UBI), which a former OpenAI researcher believes could feasibly reach as high as $10,000 per month thanks to AI-enabled growth.

Fears of mass unemployment due to AI have been a concern for years. OpenAI boss Sam Altman realized this threat in 2016, long before ChatGPT's launch, and conducted an experiment aimed at showing that UBI could negate some of the issues.

Most UBI programs give money to adults in the form of recurring payments, regardless of how much they already have or their employment status. The amount tends to vary from $500 per month to $1,500.

For many people, that just isn't enough to cover the bills should they lose their jobs – especially if they have no savings.

Miles Brundage, who was OpenAI's senior policy advisor and head of the AGI readiness team until 2024, believes that the impact ever-advancing AI will have on the economy will allow UBI payments to eventually reach $10,000 per month.

$1k/month is relevant to what's feasible policy-wise today.

$10k/month is relevant to what will be feasible policy-wise in a few years with AI-enabled growth.

We'll research this eventually, but only after having made many consequential public policy decisions + wasted time.

– Miles Brundage (@Miles_Brundage) August 20, 2025

"I think that a significantly more generous UBI experiment than has been tried so far (say, $10k/month vs. $1k/month) would show big effects," he wrote on X.

"$1k/month is relevant to what's feasible policy-wise today," Brundage said. "$10k/month is relevant to what will be feasible policy-wise in a few years with AI-enabled growth."

Altman's experiment gave 1,000 people $1,000 per month, while a 2,000-person control group was given $50 per month.

While one of the concerns about UBI is that it will encourage people to not work, the findings from Altman's tests showed that most recipients kept working and only increased their spending on basic needs, such as food, housing, and transportation.

Recipients were also more likely to visit a hospital, see a specialist, go to the dentist, and cut down on excess alcohol and drug use. They also reported lower stress and higher life satisfaction.

Interestingly, recipients were more selective when it came to choosing work: some chose lower-paid jobs for more independence or the opportunity to enter a certain industry. They were also more likely to start their own business.

Elon Musk once said that AI will replace all human jobs, and Bill Gates believes it will lead to workweeks consisting of just two or three days. When Brundage resigned from OpenAI, he said he worried a lot about the technology disrupting opportunities for people who desperately wanted work, but he did believe AI and AGI could eventually remove the obligation to work for a living. It sounds optimistically utopian, though we're not ready for such a scenario just yet.

"That is not something we're prepared for politically, culturally, or otherwise, and needs to be part of the policy conversation. A naive shift toward a post-work world risks civilizational stagnation (see: WALL-E), and much more thought and debate about this is needed," Brundage wrote at the time.

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AI-enabled growth could push universal basic income to $10,000 a month, says former OpenAI researcher

 

[opckieran]

How on earth did we forget the simple truth that helicopter money (the literal devaluation of currency) leads to inflation? This isn’t even up for debate!

They want to give everybody an arbitrary amount of money while ignoring the fact that wealth actually comes from the creation of VALUE, not just from having a ton of fiat to spend!

 

[yRaz]

How on earth did we forget the simple truth that helicopter money (the literal devaluation of currency) leads to inflation? This isn’t even up for debate!

They want to give everybody an arbitrary amount of money while ignoring the fact that wealth actually comes from the creation of VALUE, not just from having a ton of fiat to spend!

I'm in favor of UBI, but we need to sterilize the people who accept/choose that. I'm at a stage in my life where I work because I want to, not because I have to.

It's funny how quickly we forgot how the COVID money created rapid inflation

 

[Hexic]

Removing the incentive, and therefore someone’s identity to work at whatever given job they’re at will only lead to more people choosing not to contribute to society.

UBI sounds great on paper, but will not work in reality. We have decades of welfare recipient research to solidify this. Supplemental assistance (welfare) is great for a temporary bind (while you’re actively searching the job market), but indefinite payments lead to a slippery slope of permanent dependency.

 

[SRB]

While Altman and Co. think that displace workers should receive payments from the AI dividend, the hard truth is that it's the ONLY company who seems to think this way. Tik-Tok, Coinbase, et. al. can't wait to have AI replace as many workers as they can. None of them are doing it for productivity, efficiency, or any other benign reason. They are looking solely at maximizing shareholder value and lining their own pockets. And they'll want the government to make the payments and spread the costs to everyone rather than out ot the company till.

 

[axiomatic13]

I swear, we will try anything except adjusting wages to current inflation levels. Your greed sickens me.

 

[noel24]

AI is like next stage of computing, like changing phone centrals from human operated to computers, like introducing computers to operate NY stock exchange. It will not bring billions of dollars from new markets in poor Asia and Africa markets, It just replaces current operators. It will not bring new billions of dollars to the market, It will just redistribute the wealth of the ones already in operation. I cannot believe that current overlords are so stupid to not understand It and invest trillions into AI, without a chance of return. How? How people can be that stupid? IT SCREAMS NVIDIA BUBBLE FROM THOUSAND MILES AWAY!!!

 

[godrilla]

How on earth did we forget the simple truth that helicopter money (the literal devaluation of currency) leads to inflation? This isn’t even up for debate!

They want to give everybody an arbitrary amount of money while ignoring the fact that wealth actually comes from the creation of VALUE, not just from having a ton of fiat to spend!

But but $10,000 to buy a piece of bread that you have to wait on a line is the end goal as long as the ai is doing all the heavy lifting.

 

[noel24]

But but $10,000 to buy a piece of bread that you have to wait on a line is the end goal as long as the ai is doing all the heavy lifting.

NEVER, EVER offer the least earning people a financial incentive in the form of set currency , as It will always make capitalists consider It a free money over anything They can regularly charge. COVID handovers in US, EU and anywhere else where the biggest drivers of inflation, even if seen by general population as a relief. Government should support those in biggest need, but not by cash, more like non monetary incentives, tax reliefs, utility reliefs, food and shelter "stamps" for corporations that offer best price to the government. Cash given out is defacto printing money and raising inflation that will hurt mostly the poorest.

 

[Megalomaniac]

I'm in favor of UBI, but we need to sterilize the people who accept/choose that. I'm at a stage in my life where I work because I want to, not because I have to.

It's funny how quickly we forgot how the COVID money created rapid inflation

Any form of Universal Basic Income drives up inflation.

 

[toooooot]

That is a lie. No just a delusion, a lie. For poor to get more, rich would have to pay more. When was the last time you saw top 500 richest people of our country be happy about paying more in taxes?
Regarding his statements about wor, job is not not a term that can sum up all. Some jobs inspire and make people happy. But a lot more are soul draining slavery which a person chooses because the alternative is much worse. There are a lot of those. And these people who never did a job like that have no clue about how many of these laborers will quit immediately and will never go back to those jobs.
There are too many unpleasant jobs. And people only do them because the alternative is becoming homeless. It is a no brainer. But I can easily see how a person who enjoys high pay job cannot grasp it. After all, we all live in our own bubbles. Those tens of millions hating their jobs support this economy. It will crumble as soon as they quit.

 

[toooooot]

NEVER, EVER offer the least earning people a financial incentive in the form of set currency , as It will always make capitalists consider It a free money over anything They can regularly charge. COVID handovers in US, EU and anywhere else where the biggest drivers of inflation, even if seen by general population as a relief. Government should support those in biggest need, but not by cash, more like non monetary incentives, tax reliefs, utility reliefs, food and shelter "stamps" for corporations that offer best price to the government. Cash given out is defacto printing money and raising inflation that will hurt mostly the poorest.

We need to mention that it was not specifically giving people money that drove inflation; it was PRINTING all of it over night, lol.

 

[wiyosaya]

which a former OpenAI researcher believes could feasibly reach as high as $10,000 per month thanks to AI-enabled growth

And I could, by pure chance, go outside today and step in a pile of dog crap.

Its amazing, to me, that these people think their wild-a$$ speculations mean anything.

 

[Plutoisaplanet]

Removing the incentive, and therefore someone’s identity to work at whatever given job they’re at will only lead to more people choosing not to contribute to society.

UBI sounds great on paper, but will not work in reality. We have decades of welfare recipient research to solidify this. Supplemental assistance (welfare) is great for a temporary bind (while you’re actively searching the job market), but indefinite payments lead to a slippery slope of permanent dependency.

People with the solution of UBI are thinking from consumers' perspectives when in reality economies are run by suppliers. Unless you can make more stuff for less human labor, you cannot discount it because you will run into shortages (aka every communist country ever). Even AI will have costs as it depends on limited resources (R&D, energy, supply chains, transportation, maintenance).

Things will become cheaper automatically if work can be more efficiently done by AI. So instead, those prices will drop as they overtake their competitors. It means people will have more money to buy other stuff, so other human made stuff will also automatically become slightly more expensive (depending on its efficiency). Providing UBI would only exacerbate this.

People who lose their jobs due to AI replacing them MUST find other work or compromise by relying on someone else who is willing to pay for them... That's all there is to it. Otherwise your economy will inevitably have issues until market forces adapt to unnatural UBI (and the economy will probably deteriorate).

 

[ScottSoapbox]

Except that $10,000 will barely buy groceries due to the continued devaluation of the dollar. Oops.

 

[p51d007]

UBI?
Just look at what WELFARE has done to society since 1964.

 

[BuckarooBonzaii]

We don't get something for nothing. At 10 grand a month they will own you, but too many will be dazzled at this amount, they won't think about the possible ramifications. To me UBI is not free money but a contract between you and the Government and contracts can be changed. UBI will be used as a bargining chip.

 

[Str8Shot]

Except that $10,000 will barely buy groceries due to the continued devaluation of the dollar. Oops.

Shhh…you’re not supposed to figure this out yet. Wait until it’s implemented, and only then you’ll see the real effects. Or as crazy old bat Nancy Pelosi once said: “we have to pass it to see what’s in it.”

 

[Str8Shot]

We don't get something for nothing. At 10 grand a month they will own you, but too many will be dazzled at this amount, they won't think about the possible ramifications. To me UBI is not free money but a contract between you and the Government and contracts can be changed. UBI will be used as a bargining chip.

This is the truth few people see and realize, the proverbial fine print. Any government assistance is ownership of you and your freedom to spend the money. It’ll likely be a digital currency, with limits and controls imposed on it, like fatso Augustin Karsten from the BIS said a few years ago. They’ll never surrender control, and they certainly won’t ever give back more freedoms to the serfs…

 

[godrilla]

Found a nice table for a great History lesson on the Peaks of hyperinflation as high as 4.19x 10 to 16th power % increase in Hungary over a month. So $10k for bread for a slice of bread not the loaf can be possible. fyi

Hyperinflation - Wikipedia https://share.google/NkH9OFzAwbVXazaft

 

[JoeBlowMe]

The people commenting on this forum have no idea how UBI and AI abundance works. They should at least do a little bit of research before posting their emotions.

The reason UBI works with AI abundance is the cost of production of all goods will drop so much due to AI and robotics that most goods will nearly be free. This causes massive deflation as prices drop and will also lead to massive unemployment. This is the definition of recession. The UBI will come from a combination of value added taxes and printing money. This won't cause inflation do to the massive deflation. The business are happy about UBI or else they won't have any customers to purchase their products. Finally, what else can we do? Most everyone will eventually be unemployed. They have to get money from somewhere. Where else?

 

[natashasturrock]

If AI really drives the kind of growth people are predicting, $10k/month UBI doesn’t sound crazy. Altman’s trial already showed people kept working — just with more freedom and less stress. The bigger challenge won’t be money, but political will and fair distribution.

 

[Superconductor]

The brain washing continues...

 

[Gezzer]

The people commenting on this forum have no idea how UBI and AI abundance works. They should at least do a little bit of research before posting their emotions.

The reason UBI works with AI abundance is the cost of production of all goods will drop so much due to AI and robotics that most goods will nearly be free. This causes massive deflation as prices drop and will also lead to massive unemployment. This is the definition of recession. The UBI will come from a combination of value added taxes and printing money. This won't cause inflation do to the massive deflation. The business are happy about UBI or else they won't have any customers to purchase their products. Finally, what else can we do? Most everyone will eventually be unemployed. They have to get money from somewhere. Where else?

You just posted for me. TY. I'm so tired of the "production drives the economy" thinking. How?? If you produce a 100,000 products a month and only 100 people have the disposable income to purchase them how does that drive an economy? Really?? Yes, production is the engine that drives an economy, but consumption is the fuel for that engine. It's pretty obvious to me that everyone against the UBI idea are people in the higher tax brackets and only care about their own wealth status.

As for a UBI I'm all for it, a more sane progressive tax system that gets increased revenue from large corporations and the ultra wealthy would easily offset the cost of a UBI. Will it happen? Not a chance IMHO. As this thread clearly illustrates there are way too many conservative manger dogs that only care about themselves and their peers. "Eat the rich"? If the concentration of wealth/capital into fewer and fewer hands accelerates with AI it might become the poor's only option.

Thank God I'll most likely be dead by then. What scares me is I won't be for WW3, which could be looming due to our inability to manage the world in a sane and equitable manner.

 

[trents]

Removing the incentive, and therefore someone’s identity to work at whatever given job they’re at will only lead to more people choosing not to contribute to society.

UBI sounds great on paper, but will not work in reality. We have decades of welfare recipient research to solidify this. Supplemental assistance (welfare) is great for a temporary bind (while you’re actively searching the job market), but indefinite payments lead to a slippery slope of permanent dependency.

Absolutely correct. Humanity was created with the need to work in order to maintain physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual health balance and health. Work is healthy.